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CITY OF MEMPHIS 

Shelby County, Tennessee, 



HISTORICAL ADDRESS 



JULY 4th, 1876, 






BY HON. W: Tf AVERY. 

.1 Vv * 



My Fellow Countrymen and Country- 
women, composing this vast concourse 
of* people — In approaching the per 
formance of the duty which has been 
assigned me to-day, t do so distrusting 
in no slight degree my ability to fulfill 
in a manner befitting the magnitude 
and importance of the occasion. And 
with its magnitude and importance I 
am profoundly impressed.' Very much 
afraid am I, too, that those who hear 
me to day will be disappointed in the 
character of the address they will listen 
to. Although the requirements of the 
occasion call more especially for historic 
facts than rhapsodies of fancy, yet one 
more gifted than myself might well 
invest his lofty theme with those 
charms of oratory which it will not be 
possible for me, in the poverty of my 
resources, to employ. We are here, 
therefore, in patriotic response to a 
resolution ol Congress, as well as a 
proclamation of the President, for the 
purpose of making a brief and com- 
pendiou? history of our county and our 
city, that the same may be filed with 

— 



the Librarian of Congress at Wash- 
ington, and also in the archives of 
our own county. And it is a pleasing 
thought that today, at this hour, 
throughout the length and breadth of 
the land, everywhere in this great Re- 
public of ours on this, our Centennial 
day, this patriotic duty is being per- 
formed. So, then, my fellow citizens 
of the county of Shelby, you will please 
be content with the plain recital of such 
facts and incidents connected with the 
early history of our county and our 
city, and the mention of those revered 
names closely identified with their 
foundation, as I shall be able crudely 
and imperfectly to group together in 
the brief space of time it will be proper 
to employ in the presentation of them ; 
I hope, too, it will be borne in mind 
that in the short time allotted it will 
be impossible to embrace in this sketch 
many, very many of the names and in- 
cidents it would be both pleasing and 
profitable to record. The great diffi- 
culty which confronts me at the thresh- 
old is not the paucity of material, but 






from the varied historical facts, inci- 
dents and names which crowd upon 
the memory of your historian 
which to select and which 
to discard. I wish it was possible that 
the early history of every name con- 
nected with the first settlement of our 
county and our town could find a. 
place in this imperfect record; knowing 
most of them personally as I did, it 
would be a labor of love to em- 
balm their memories in historic paye. 
But this cannot be done. To my task 
then. The spot we inhabit to day is 
rich in the history of the past. It was 
upon these bluffs that more than three 
hundred years atro, not fiity years after 
that great navigator, Columbus, had 
lifted from the seas a hidden continent 
and held out to view a new and undis- 
covered world ; that that wonderful but 
ill fated Spaniard, Hernando DeSoto, 
discovered our great river and with the 
crucifix in one hand and the sword in 
the other, planted upon its savage 
banks the Christian cross. A little be- 
low our city still stand, despite the 
effacing fingers of time, the remains of 
the mounds of Chisca, which history 
tells us is the name of the village which 
DeSoto founded upon reaching the 
river. A little more than one hundred 
years thereafter, Father Marquette, 
a missionary, together with an 
explorer named Joliette, descend- 
ed the Mississippi in canoes, 
and from the maps and charts accom- 
panying the history of their explora- 
tions, evidently camped for a season 
upon these bluffs, as they passed along. 
A few years thereafter a French ex- 
plored named La Salle, under a com- 
mission from his Government to "per- 
fect the discovery of the Mississippi," 
built a fort and established the armies 
of France upon the 4th Chick as**/ 
Bluff. In 1739, Bienville, third Gover- 
nor of Louisiana, and founder of New 
Orleans, in his campaign against the 
Chickasaws, established Fort Assump- 
tion, and remained the winter here. 
In 1782 General Gayoso, from whom the 
bayou that runs up stream through our 
city, from its southern to its northern 
limits, takes its name, by authority of 
the Spanish Government, occupied the 
bluff, and at the mouth of Wolf river 
established Fort Fernandina. In 1803 
General Pike took possession of the 
fort and planted the stars and stripes in 
place of the Spanish flag. Some time 
thereafter General Wilkerson dis- 



mantled this fort and established 
Fort Pickeiing which stood down 
near the Jackson Mounds long 
after my remembrance, and 
I have often seen hoys 

with their pocket knives picking 
out the bullets embedded in the timbers 
of the old block houses of the fort. 
Shelby county was named in honor of 
Isaac She by, the first Governor of 
Kentucky, and who, by the side of 
Sevier, distinguished himself at the 
battle of King's Mountain. In 1818, 
together with General Jackson, he nego- 
tiated upon this bluff an advantageous 
treaty with the Chickasaws, by which 
were ceded to the United States all the 
lands in West Tennessee, then known 
as the Chickasaw purchase. The coun- 
ty was established bv an act of the Leg- 
islature, then sitting at Murfreesboro, 
passed November 24, 1819, and on the 
1st day of May, 1820, the first Court was 
organized, composed of Wm. Irvine, 
Chairman; Jacob Tipton, Anderson B. 
Carr, M. B. Winchester, ThosTD. Uarr, 
and Benj. Willis. The first county offi- 
cers were: Sam'l R. Brown, Sheriff; 
Wm. Lawrence, Clerk; Thos. Taylor, 
Register; Alex. Ferguson, Ranger; 
William A. Davis, Trustee; Gideon 
Carr, Coroner; William FJettis "and 
William Dean, Constables, and 
John J. Perkins sworn in as attorney. 
The first Grand Jurors of the county 
were Thomas H. Persons, foreman; 
Wm. Roberts, John Grace, John W. 
Oadham, Drury Betas, Patrick Meagh- 
ar, Thomas Palmer, Humphrey 
Williams, J. W. Riddle, J. Fletcher, 
Joseph James, and Robert Quinby. The 
first Petit Jury ever sworn in the coun- 
ty were Daniel Harkleroad, Robert Mc- 
Allister, W7m~ T Fhompson, Tilman Bet- 
tis, Enos Wade, Wm. Bettis, W. D. 
Ferguson, Gideon Carr, Wm. West, Ar- 
nold Kelly and Benjamin Willis, sworn 
to try Henry Gibson for an assault "and 
battery. It will be observed that this 
was the beginning of civil government 
in our county and that this initial court 
had all the jurisdiction of our Chancery, 
Circuit, Criminal and County Courts; 
hence the responsibility of the court 
was great, and the sterling character, 
unbending integrity, and good sense of 
the men who composed it left their im- 
press upon the community they estab- 
lished. The County of Shelby is 
the wealthiest in the State, 
occupying the extreme south- 
west corner of the State, and em- 



3 



bracing an area of 720 square miles, with 
a taxable property of about $40,000,000, 
being one-eighth of the whole taxable 
property of the whole State. At the 
organization of the county, in 1820, 
there were but 364 inhabitants; in 1830, 
5648; in 1840, 14,721; in 1850, 31,157; in 
1860,48,092; and in 1870, 76,378, show- 
ing an increase of population far out- 
stripping any other county in the State. 
Besides the city of Memphis, the county 
can boast of quite a number of flourish- 
ing villages, situated on the different 
lines of railroad running out from the 
city — Bartlett, Germantown, Collier- 
ville and others, the last mentioned 
being 24 miles out on the Memphis and 
Charleston railroad, a place of much 
commercial importance, with a popula- 
tion of some 1200. I wish I had time 
and opportunity to allude in befitting 
terms to the geology, topography and 
soil of this magnificent county. To tell 
of its varied resources, the salubrity of 
its climate, the cheapness of its lands, 
the rich yield of its products, and the 
variety of its production*, its railroad 
and other facilities, its schools, 
colleges and other institutions 
its great resources and advantages, and 
to present to you to day as it deserves 
to be presented the wonderful advance- 
ment which has been made in all the 
material interests that go to make up a 
great and prosperous part of a Kate. 
But I must rapidly pass from this cur- 
sory view of our county to our own 
town, whose history is part and parcel 
of the county. Memphis, like its 
namesake of the Nile, stands upon the 
banks of a great inland sea, with a 
delta broader and richer far thau that 
through which the great Egyptian 
river flowed in the days of the grandeur, 
wealth and glory of its ancient^ metro- 
» polis. It is the chief city, and about 
equi-distant between St. Louis, and 
Louisville and New Orleans. It was 
laid out as a town in 1819, on what is 
known as the John Rice grant, being a 
grant of 5000 acres of land by the State 
of North Carolina to John Rice, John 
Rice having parted with his in- 
terest to John Overton, Andrew Jack- 
son, William, George and James 
Winchester, who were the original 
proprietors of the town. In 1822, how- 
ever, Gen. Jackson sold his proprietary 
interest to John C. McLemore. Jacob 
Tipton was appointed Surveyor Gen- 
eral of this, tne eleventh surveyor's 
district. Of the long list of Deputy 



Surveyors appointed by Gen. Tipton to 
lay off and survey this vast territory 
recently acquired, consisting of John 
Ralston, William Lawrence, James 
Vaulx, James Caruthers, John H. Bills, 
Nathan and Joel Pinson and James 
Brown, the last mentioned only re- 
mains, and is to-day spending the rem- 
nant of his days in peace and quietude 
with his children in the neighborhood 
of Memphis. The old tavern, known 
as the "Bell Tavern," where Tipton 
had his surveyor's office, and where 
Jackson and Overton, and the Win- 
chesters and McLemore, all of them, 
used to "put up," still stands on the 
corner of Toncray's alley and Front 
street, an old building with cedar 
posts in the ground and weather- 
boarded up. I believe it was at that 
time kept by Col. Nathan Anderson, 
as grand a type of the old Virginia gen- 
tleman as that famous old State ever 
sent to the wilderness of the West. He 
has children and grandchildren still 
among us Rearing his honored name. 
Although the town was laid off in 
1819, yet it was not until 1826 that by 
an act of the Legislature it was made 
an incorporated town, and on the 3d of 
March, 1827, the first election was held 
for town officers, composed of M. B. 
Winchester, Mayoi, and Joseph L. 
Davis, John Hook, N. B. Atwood, 
George J*. Graham and John R. Doug- 
herty, Aldermen ; the two last of whom, 
however, died during the year, their 
places being filled by Nathaniel Ander- 
son and Littleton Henderson. During 
that year, the county seat was moved 
from Memphis to Raleigh, where it re- 
mained ior more than forty years. The 
first Postmaster in Memphis was 
Captain Thomas Stewart, an offi- 
cpr of the Twenty-fourth regiment of 
United States infantry, and formerly 
a citizen of Jonesboro, East Tennessee. 
He, however, died soon after his ap- 
pointment, and is buried where the 
First Presbyterian Church now stands, 
at the corner of Third and Poplar, that 
being the first graveyard in Memphis. 
Marcus B. Winchesler was the success- 
or of Capt. Stewart, and remained Post- 
master for many years. The first bank 
in Memphis was the Farmers' and 
Merchants', established in 1835, with 
Robert Lawrence, President, and Chas. 
Lofland Cashier. The old building in 
which itdid its first business still stands 
on the northeast corner of Main and 
Winchester streets, with the figures 303 



prominently painted high up on its 
walls. This is the first point in Tennes 
see where LaFayette landed in his tri- 
umphal visit to the United States in 
1824, and the last that the immortal 
Crockett ever saw of his natve State 
when he turned his face toward strug- 
gling Texas to meet his sad fate at the 
fall of the Alamo. The population of 
Memphis in 1820 was 53; in 1830, 663; 
in 1840, 2,000; in 1850, 10,000; in 1860, 
27,623; in 1870, 48,230. The city direc- 
tory for 1876 shows 15,260 names against 
13,472 iu the last directory. Multiply- 
ing the number of names by four, 
as is the most common custom, would 
give us a present population of 61,040, 
and an increase of 7,152 since the publi- 
cation of the last directory. 

In 1826, the first corporate year of 
Memphis, her cotton receipts were 300 
bales, all told; in 1830, 1000 bales; in 
1840, 35,000: in 1850-51, 163,000; in 
1860-61, 396,000. The sales of cotton 
this year amounted to $39,000,000; sales 
of merchandise to $9,700,000; of articles 
manufactured here, $3,000,000; total 
business, $51,700,000. Of the year 
1870-71, I have no reliable statistics; 
but tor the years 1873-74 the receipts of 
cotton were 417,171 bales, value of gen- 
eral merchandise and cotton, $73,016,- 
867; of articles manufactured here, $5, 
300,860; total business, $78,317,777, an 
increase since 1861, of $24,316,867 in gen- 
eral business, and of $2,300,860 in value 
of manufactured articles produced here. 
The figures for the current year have 
not been made up, but I am informed 
by John S. Toof, Esq., the efficient and 
able Secretary ot the Chamber of Com- 
merce, that to date the receipts have 
reached 481,081 bales, and by Septem- 
ber 1st, the end of the commercial year, 
they will reach close upon 500,000 bales, 
with a corresponding increase in the 
sales of general merchandise and 
manufactured articles produced here. 
The volume of receipts, therefore, 
properly ranks Memphis as the 
third in importance of aU the great cot 
ton receiving points in the United 
States. Up to about the year 1836-7, as 
some amongst us may still remember, a 
great rivalry existed between Randolph 
and Memphis; the former town at one 
time shipping as much cotton and doing 
as much business as Memphis; an 1 it 
seemed about to wrest from her the 
palm of commercial superiority. But 
about that period the United States 
Government purchased from theChick- 



asaws that vast scope of magnificent 
country which now makes up the whole 
of North Mississippi, the rapid settle- 
ment of which, all tributary to Mem- 
phis, threw into her lap a large and 
increasing trade, and Randolph per- 
ished as a place of business. It is ever 
pleasing to recur to the early history of 
our county and our city, and of the 
sterling men who founded them, but 
peculiarly so is it upon this Centennial 
occasion. We ought, indeed, to fully 
appreciate this great opportunity of put- 
ting upon record, in something like 
enduring form, their names and deeds. 
The history of every country 
shows that the pioneers, the first set- 
tlers, the men who blazed the pathway 
and established the civilization of the 
country, were marked men in their day 
and generation; men noted for their 
high integrity, energy and enterprise. 
They are the men who stamp the im- 
press of their character upon the country 
they establish. Look at the Boones, 
Shelbys, Clays, Hardins, Hendersons 
and Adairs of Kentucky; the Bentons, 
Atchisons and others of Missouri; the 
Seviers, Pikes, Yells, Johnsons, of Ar- 
kansas; the lioustons, Busks, Austins, 
Burlesons, of Texas; the Jacksons, Car- 
rolls Craigheads, Whites, Overtons, 
Seviers, Tiptons, Crocketts, Winches- 
ters, of Tennessee; and then coming 
along down to our own goodly countv, 
look at the men who were its first set- 
tlers—the men who wrested from the 
savage, who had held undisputed pos- 
session of this vast country, the scepter 
of civilization, and planted deep and 
broad in the fairest portion of our State 
the great principles of civil government 
and enlightened liberty. Let me put 
upon record such of their names as I 
can call to mind, that they may be re- 
membered and their memories cher- 
ished: NSthaniel Anderson, M. B. Win- 
chester, Anderson B. Carr, Charles D. 
McLean, James Rose, John Houston, 
Neil B. Holt, Zacheus Joiner, Tilma n 
Bettis, who landed at the mouTh~of 
Wolf in 1819 on a flatboat with his fami- 
ly; Enoch and James Banks, Solomon 
Rozell, Wilks BrooKs, N. Ragiand, 
Eugene Magevney, Isaac Raw lings, 
Robert Lawrence, G. B. Locke, Fraz t 
Titus, S. M. Nelson, Samuel Mosby, 
Joseph H. Mosby, J. J. Rawlings, \V. 
D. Fergusou, Charles Lofiand, John 
Ralston, Wyatt Christian, Robertson 
Topp, Seth Wheailey, Hez j kiah Cobb, 
Samuel Leake, Richard Le;>ke, John 



R. Frayser, Starkey Redditt, John F. 
Sehabel, John Y. Bayliss, Emanuel 
Young and his worthy sons, Gus, Tom 
and Henry, James D. Davis, Edwin 
Hickman, Frederick Christian, Jesse 
Benton, Roger Barton, Wm. Battle, 
John K. Balch, Joseph Graham, John 
D. Graham, John W. Fowler, S. T. 
Toncray, Cesario Bias, Geo. W. Fisher, 
James C. Jones, and then the Reaves, 
Remberts, Smiths and Taylors of 
Raleigh; the Harrels, Messicks, Pres- 
cotts, Peytons, Parks, McKeons, Green- 
laws, Newsoms, Richards, Kimbroughs, 
Persons, Bunds, Lakes, Fowlkes, Do- 
tys, Waldrans, Duncans, Echols, Eck- 
lins, Hardaways, Hawkins, Harts, 
Howards, Holmes, Popes, Rudisils, 
Sanderlins, Spickeroagles, Trezevants, 
Triggs, Whitsitts. Eppy aud John D. 
White, Yates, Dunns, Tales, Buutyns, 
Goldsbys, and many others I 
might mention. And, let me say 
here, that if all the children 
or children's children who chance to 
see that the names of their worthy 
fathers are not in this brief record, let 
it be charged to the frailty of human 
recollection, and not that they did not 
deserve a place in this imperfect role. 
At the period of which I now particu- 
larly speak, because my personal iden- 
tity with Memphis dates from that 
time, I think I can mention every law 
yer, doctor and merchant, of which 
Memphis could then boast. Of 

THE MERCHANTS, 

let me mention Wilks Brooks, Joseph 
Cooper, Isaac Rawlings, M. B. Win- 
chester, Anderson B. Carr, Wiley Kim- 
brough, Samuel Mosby, W. D. Dab 
ney, Nelson & Titus, La wrence& Davis, 
Neil McCeul, Zich Edmonds, Nath. 
Anderson, Park & Graham, and W. B. 
Miller, who was the pioneer wholesale 
merchant of the city. The doctors were 
Dr. Wyatt Christian (a great and good 
man),Wheatley & Frayser, our present 
estimable Dr. John R. Frayser and M. 
B. Sappington. The lawyers consisted 
of R. C. MeAlpin, P. G. Gaines, Seth 
Wheatley and Robertson Topp, whose 
mortal remains were followed to the 
grave the oth^r day by a large con- 
coufse of the oldest citizens of the city. 
The preachers at this early period prin- 
cipally, were Father Whitsitt, Silas T. 
Toncray. Elijah CoffVy, and the now 
venerable Thomas P. Davidson, still 
living in the neighborhood, whose cir- 
cuit extended throughout the length 



and breadth of this wilderness of the 
West. 

OLD TIME NEWSPAPERS. 

The first newspaper published here 
was the Memphis Advocate, by Thos. 
Phoebus. Soon thereafter it was sup- 
planted by the Memphis Gazette, pub- 
lished by P. G. Gaines and James H. 
Murray, printed on material purchased 
from our venerable patriarch, Charles 
D. McLean, himself the pioneer of the 
press in West Tennessee, and then pub- 
lishing in Jackson, Tenn., the leading 
journal in all this country — The Jack- 
son Gazette. About this time, however, 
there was being published at Randolph 
Tenn., the rival town heretofore alluded 
to, a larger paper called the Randolph 
Recorder, by F. S.Latham, one of the 
pioneers of the press in this country, 
who is still living not many miles 
away, and illustrates more vividly the 
character of a hard handed granger, 
with hay seed in his hair, than of the 
honest, bold pioneer journalist of earlier 
days. In 1836 Latham started the En- 
quirer, with whom that accomplished 
journalist J. H. McMahon subsequently 
became identified. McMahon afterward 
established the Bulletin. And Latham 
again, in January, 1842, printed 
at Fort Pickering the Memphis Eagle, 
which I have seen him myself dis- 
tribute to his Memphis subscribers from 
a bundle tied up in a bandanna hand- 
kerchief. After the Enquirer, followed 
the Western World aud Memphis Ban- 
ner of the Constitution, by Solon Bor- 
land. What a name! Then came the 
lamented Van Pelt with the Appeal, 
which alone of all this long list, together 
with many others I might mention, 
has stood the vicissitudes of time, and 
still maintains its high place as a jour- 
nalistic power in the land. The Ava- 
lanche, founded by M. C. Gallaway 
in 1858, also takes rank among the lead- 
ing journals of the day. The Ledger, 
a live evening daily, besides half a 
dozen weeklies, both religious and 
secular, go to swell the newspaper 
record of our city. 

My countrymen, although not cov- 
etous of being considered an old man, 
I have myself seen the red man of the 
forest, whose primeval home was not 
a half day's journey on horseback from 
where we now stand, pushed away 
across the gr^at river, over to the 
wilderness of the west, aud the native 
wilds he then inhabited, peopled by a 



hardy, intelligent and enterprising 
population. . Flourishing towns and 
young cities, marts of commerce and 
centers of civilization and refinement 
now adorn the places where savage 
huts then stood. I have personally 
known every chief magistrate Memphis 
has ever had (save those appointed by 
military authority during the war), 
from Winchester, the first, down to 
His Honor Judge Flippin, who is help- 
ing us celebrate here to-day. I have 
seen every stately structure that now 
stands between Pinch and Pickering 
rise from the earth in their majesty and 
beauty, monuments, as they are, to the 
skill, enterprise, energy and public 
spirit of such citizpnsas Lemuel Austin, 
the Saffarans, Charley Jones, the lament- 
ed Greenlaws, and many others I might 
mention, who builded up this young 
city of ours. 

And now, having, in afeebleand im- 
perfect manner, presented some of the 
leading historical features connected 
with the foundation of our county and 
our city, aud made honorable mention 
)f such names as I could bring to mem> 
ory connected therewith, may we not 
be pardoned if we pause for a moment 
on the top of this Centennial Pisgah 
where we stand to-day, and taking a 
more extended range of vision, view 

OUR PROMISED LAND. 

Look at it as it stands mapped out 
before us and before the world to-day! 
From thirteen snarsely populated colo- 
nies, with three millions o( people, this 
Centennial day dawned on thirty-eight 
independent States, some of them 
young empires in themselves, with 
iorty millions of population. But a 
little while ago, long within the mem- 
ory of many who hear me to-day, the 
star of our empire had scarcely peeped 
over the blue heights of the Alleghauies 
in the east. This star, still westward 
taking its onward way, has gone on, 
and on, and on, until it has shot across 
a continent, and to-day shines its glit- 
tering sheen in the placid waters of the 
golden shored facific. May we not be 
pardoned, then, for indulging in a little 
patriotic <rush upon this occasion, espe- 
cially w r hen we contemplate our won- 
derful advancement as a people and as 
a nation, in arts, in arms, in science, in 
agriculture and the mechanic arts, in 
inventions and discoveries, incommerce 
and navigation, and in internal im- 
provements, with our .seventy-three 



thousand miles of railroads rami- 
fying every portion of the Repub- 
lic; in everything that goes to make up 
the greatness and power of a people 
and a nation. In attestation of which 
may we not proudly point to the great 
Centennial Exposition now spread out 
in grand review within sound of the old 
Liberty Beli which one hundred years 
ago to day first pealed out its proclama- 
tion to the world that a new nation had 
been born to liberty that day. I say, 
may we not point with a little exultaut 
pride to the fact that to day in the front 
rank of honorable competition with all 
the most favored and enlightened na- 
tions of the earth, both great and small, 
the American States are. exhibiting all 
these industrial and material evidences 
of wonderful advancement. The Great 
Pacific Railway, too, stretching from 
ocean to ocean, tying these States to- 
gether as with bands of steel. The 

NORTH UNITED TO THE SOUTH 

by those natural channels of commerce, 
the great rivers of the land, and the 
East bound to the West by those other 
and artificial iron bonds of perpetual 
union; this nation is designed as the 
God of Nature and of Nations too, de 
creed it ever should be, now and for- 
ever, one and inseparable. 

To the American mind is the civi- 
lized world indebted for the two great 
inventions of this or any other a^e. It 
was a Fulton who first harnessed steam 
and drove it to the cars of commerce 
and to the floating fleets of navigation. 
In all the rivers of the earth, aud in 
all the seas wherever the flag of com- 
merce floats, and the light of civiliza- 
tion shines, every revolution of the 
mighty wheels that move the steam 
monarchs of the deep, and the lesser 
vessels upon the thousand rivers, both 
great and small, and every puff of steam 
that is sent forth from the countless 
scape pipes, proclaim in thunder tones 
the genius of a Fulton. Every electric 
click that flashes upon the thousaud 
jvires its myriad messages over the 
lands and under the seas, throughout 
the world and around the globe, pro- 
claim forever to ail peoples the genius, 
and perpetuate the memory of the im- 
mortal Morse. 

Did any people who have ever lived 
since creation's dawn and since the 
morning stars first sang together, have 
so great cause to be proud of their coun- 
try and its achievements? 



w 



The Frenchman when he seeks a 
home amongst us still loves best the 
vine clad hills of France. 

1 he Italian, though true and stead- 
fast to his adopted country, each year 
must renew his vows of love to the 
land of Columbus. The Englishman, 
full ot the glories of his sea-girt isle, is 
full, too, of the thought that she is mis- 
tress of the seas and that "Britania rules 
the waves " Thp German, coming as 
he does from the home and birth-place 
of learning and of science, each return- 
ing Mai-Fest rekindles afresh unfad- 
ing memories of his Fatherland. Who 
can chide the rugged sou of grand old 
Scotia for cherishing in his heart of 
hearts a filial devotion to the land of 
Bruce and of Burns, of Wallace and of 
Walter Scott? The Irishman too, 
eager, as he ever is, to enlist in the 
wars and fight the battles of his adopted 
country, never can forget his green 
isl*- of the ocean, his shamrock and his 
shillallah; and every St. Patrick's Day 
in the Morning pours out anew the offer- 
ings of his heart upon the altar of his 
native land. All people of all nations 
who seek an asylum in our midst, 
though born to a new liberty, and 
awakened to a new citizenship and 
baptised in a new dispensation, never 
banish from their recollection the 
memories of the land that gave them 
birth. Oh, may we not be pardoned 
to-day— this hundredth anniversary of 
our nation's birth — for enkindling 
afresh upon the altars of our hearts the 
fires of patriotism and love to "our own, 
our native land." 

Our foreign-born brethren of every 
clime and of every kindred join with 
us everywhere in one universal chorus 
of devotion to this great heritage, the 
land of our nativity and of their adop- 



THIS FOURTH OF JULY 

is a common heritage; it belongs to no 
North, no South, no East, no West. 
Men of the South as well as men of the 
North aided in establishing this em- 
pire of freedom. It is the united work 
of both. Th*s.South gave to the coun- 
try him who wrote the charter of our 
liberties. The South gave to the world 
a Washington. Let the names of 
Washington and Jefferson be indisso- 
lubly and forever linked with those of 
Hancock, Adams, Franklin. We 
ot the South have an undying glory in 
our nation's birthright. The great prin- 
ciples th*t underlie the foundation of 
our Government, enunciated by the 
Fathers of the Republic, established 
by their swords and cemented by their 
blood; those great doctrines of civil 
liberty and human government, set 
iorth in the unequaled instrument 
which has been read* to day, are as dear 
to the South as to the North, and to 
the North as to the South. Theyaie 
the great bulwarks upon which we 
rest as the sheet anchor of our liberties, 
as a people, and our perpetuity as a 
government. And now a little about 
brotherly love. Long before the politi- 
cal differences between the North and 
the South had culminated in a cala- 
mitous war, the same disturbing ele- 
ment, that Illiad of our woes, now no 
more, that divided us politically had 
cleft in twain the churches ot the liv- 
ing God. 

That great popular organization, the 
Methodist Church, for more than thirty 
years has been divided into two dis- 
tinct and separate governments, North 
and South. Thank God this Centen- 
nial year will see them again united. 
Listen to the eloquent and patriotic 



tion. And in the eloquent language of language of Dr. Duncan, President of 



another: -'This glorious land of ours 
that blooms between the seas, from the 
northern border of it where God's pur- 
ple-lined bow of peace glorifies Ni- 
agara's cliffs to the sea-girt southern 
line, where God's, gifts make earth 
almost an Eden of fragrance and beau- 
ty; and from the rock bound Atlantic, 
where the eastern song of the sea be- 
gins its morning music, to the far off 
Pacific, where the western waters 
murmur their benediction to our land 
as the tide goes out beneath the setting 
sun; everywhere we feel the inspira- 
tion of our country and devoutly pray 
God bless our native land." 



Randolph Macon College, who was 
sent, together with the venerable Lovick 
Pierce and Dr. Garland, Chancellor of 
Vanderbilt University, as a fra- 
ternal messenger of peace and un- 
ity to the Methodist Church North, 
recently assembled in solemn con- 
ference in the city of Baltimore. 
Iu speaking of "brotherly love," here 
is what he says to his brethren of the 
North: "With this inspiration in our 
hearts, and with this cry upon our lips 
we tear down all hostile barriers, we 
trample under foot every obstacle to 
brotherly love; we consign bitterness 
and strife to oblivion; we crush theser- 



pent of discord with our heel, and unite 
anew all the vast army of American 
Methodists in one celestial shout." This 
is the language of a 

BROKEN BROTHERHOOD, 

the one to the other. Cannot, then, the 
political and geographical sections — the 
broken brotherhood— of this Great Re- 
public, severed as they have been in 
deadly hostility, but now once more 
united; since the rainbow of peace now 
spans the continent; under the meridi- 
an splendors of this Centennial sun, 
adopt the fervid and patriotic language 



of the inspired spirit of this peace maker 
of God and the Gospel? Can we not 
agree, North and South, to wipe out 
forever Mason's and Dixon's line; tear 
down all hostile barriers; trample un- 
der foot every obstacle to brotherly 
kindness; consign bitterness and strife 
to oblivion; crush out the serpent of 
discord with our undivided and united 
heel, and unite anew all the vast army 
of forty millions of freemen in one Cen- 
tennial shout. 

"United in laKes, united in lands, 
With bonds no dissensions can sever; 

United in hearts, united in hands — 
The Flag of Our Union forever!" 






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